


The Best Revenge

by The_Laurent



Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: F/F, Gen, Post-War, Shapeshifting, Teasing, petty revenge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-24
Updated: 2020-05-24
Packaged: 2021-03-02 22:03:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,532
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24354043
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Laurent/pseuds/The_Laurent
Summary: Catra has a meeting with Double Trouble, in the aftermath of Horde Prime's defeat. Or: Just because Catra is good doesn't mean she's not still petty.
Relationships: Adora/Catra (She-Ra)
Comments: 5
Kudos: 183





	The Best Revenge

**Author's Note:**

> The Season 5 finale was great, and I did notice a rash of apology fics, where Catra deals with her guilt in greater depth. Many of these were heartwarming and I don't know if I really want to compete with that. 
> 
> So instead, have Catra messing with someone.

Catra lounged. She was _very_ good at lounging. When Adora went to boring pre-space-adventure meetings in the War Room, she often lounged in Adora’s lap, even though they’d given her a chair--not a throne, that’d just be _weird_ \--to sit on. At the moment, she was in one of the many side rooms of this confusing castle. It still felt a little bit weird. Even when she’d been on top of the Horde, she hadn’t had the kind of luxury that they apparently saw fit to stuff into random guest rooms. Their prison had just been a guest room with most of the pillows removed, and when she’d heard that, she’d laughed in Glimmer’s face. And then had to apologize. 

It always made her wonder what she was missing, that led to her defeat. She knew the answer though, knew who it was that had saved everyone, and who she trusted more than anyone else. 

There was a knock on the door, and Adora’s head poked in, followed by the rest of her. “Hey, Catra, I just wanted to check up on you.”

“Oh?” Catra purred, reclining a little further. 

“See if you were alright, talking to Double Trouble, after what they said,” Adora gave a nervous smile, looking as if she felt guilty for wanting to check up on Catra so often. Some days it felt as if Adora was terrified that if she looked away Catra would be gone. Some days Catra was the same way with Adora. 

“Oh, don’t worry about it, Double Trouble,” Catra said with a smirk.

“Drat it all!” ‘Adora’ said, as they shifted back into their real form. Drat it all? “Really, darling, what did I get wrong?”

“I haven’t told Adora what you said, just that I’d wanted to talk to you before you spilled your guts for the record. Gold’s underneath the couch, by the way.” It was remarkable how good Double Trouble was at imitating people, and even their smells. When she’d first met them, she’d been sure that anyone with a working nose would be able to tell the difference, but nope. They’d even smelled like Scorpia. 

“Ah… yes,” Double Trouble said, clearly trying as hard as they could to hide their uncertainty. There wasn’t much of it, Catra guessed, but from experience a little bit of anything can be overwhelming when you’re used to none at all. 

“So, before all that, I just wanted to say thank you,” Catra said, dripping sincerity as thick as cream. “Your truthful words helped me be better and wiser, and so it was a kind and good thing you did for me, back in the Fright Zone.” It helped that everything she said was true. 

Double Trouble was squirming awkwardly, staring at Catra as if she’d gone around the bend and back again. “I… I mean, darling, you really have changed.” They licked their lips, blinking in their reptilian way. “But… kitten, I wasn’t _trying_ to be nice.”

“Oh, you weren’t?” Catra asked, standing up, her smile growing wider and more serene. “But your words were so helpful in making me realize that I needed to change.” She padded over towards Double Trouble. The shapeshifter always wore the same outfit in their base form, and always smelled so oddly mild. She guessed it made sense, but Catra had been experimenting. Now, this outfit didn’t work. Green jacket and black pants, with her hair, made her look like some sort of kitten-shrub. But she’d figure it out. 

“I’m sure you thought you weren’t being nice,” Catra said, her voice so soft and understanding she almost gagged. “But deep down, I feel like you only want to help people.”

Double Trouble looked at Catra with suspicion. “I was in it for the money, as always. Glimmer paid me to cause trouble, so I did. Then I doubled it. That’s all.”

“You say that, but you helped stop the Horde twice, and I wouldn’t have become who I am now without you.”

“I just like messing with you, kitten, that’s all,” Double Trouble said with a dramatic sigh, raising an arm towards the heavens. “If I’d known you’d be all boring and grateful, I’d… oh.”

Catra was grinning now, almost up to Double Trouble’s face. “I knew that.” She quirked an eyebrow. “Gotcha. Though, really, I do think you’re softer and nicer than you think you are, deep down. Surely you had to be, to be so humble about my _undying gratitude_.”

There was no soft understanding in her voice now, just joy at having gotten one over on Double Trouble. 

“Right, right, kitten. Maybe I deserved that. Really, though, with how boring the ‘good guys’ usually are, can you blame me for believing you?” Double Trouble’s voice was sing-song, dismissive. 

“And yet you’re still here. Maybe you’d like to join the ‘good guys’ for good?” Catra asked, standing to her full height and looking up at Double Trouble. Her full height wasn’t much, though. “You could have tea parties and act on the stage to delight children or something.”

“Ugh, kitten,” Double Trouble said, gagging rather more dramatically than they had to. Or maybe exactly as dramatically, knowing them. “I’m leaving.”

“Oh, really? You’re doing something for free? How thoughtful and generous of you, kindly Trouble,” Catra said, in her best ‘snooty Princess voice’, the one everyone back at the Horde had tried to do when playing Soldier and Princess. “It really is good that you’ve realized that there’s more in this world than mere money, and that a good deed is its own reward.”

Double Trouble stopped, stuck between their annoyance and their desire to get paid. Then they whipped around, shifting into Shadow Weaver. “Really, Catra? You think you can beat me at my own game? I know what Shadow Weaver was to you.”

Catra was rattled, but she wasn’t going to admit it, and so she gave a brittle smile. “She was kinda terrible and a jerk, but she _did_ save our lives at the cost of her own.” Catra still wasn’t going to forgive her, but that meant at least a little bit. “Or didn’t you know that? Lots of people turn out to be a little less terrible than they think.” 

Double Trouble clearly hadn’t known, because most people didn’t. That was part of the point of getting the story from everyone, even people who were with the Horde. Bow’s dads were really enthusiastic to do it now, before people forgot things. Plus, it’d help in case there was some weird problem later on. Catra didn’t know what it’d be, but the world had almost been destroyed four times (two of them kind of her fault) in the last year, so she got why people wanted to make sure they weren’t missing anything, some secret hidden enemy or plan. 

(Catra didn’t know what she was supposed to do with her guilt. Dwelling on it was bad, but if she ignored it, would she just go back to how she used to be just a month ago?)

“I guess I’ll stay. After all, I have a job, just like… wait, what was your job again?” Double Trouble asked, shifting back into their normal form to raise their eyebrow dramatically, something they couldn’t have done as Shadow Weaver for obvious reasons. If Melog was here, it would have groaned in annoyance. “Princess Adora’s pet?”

Catra’s tail twitched and stood straight, but she took a deep breath and said, “Really? You’re going to try to make me feel bad about having a hot girlfriend? Keep trying, Double Trouble.”

“I can read your tail, kitten. I’m getting to you, and--”

There was a hard knock on the door, and both of them scrambled back, Catra tensed for a moment, ready for an attack she knew wouldn’t come. Instead, Adora stepped through, smiling at Catra and then looking over at Double Trouble. Her girlfriend, Adora. Beautiful, strong, and with a silly hair poof. This time she knew for sure it was the real one. “Are they bothering you, Catra?”

“Bothering me? Psst, no, why would they be?” Catra rolled her eyes. 

“You said they told you something you needed to hear, but, uh, I met Double Trouble before, soooo,” Adora shrugged, unable to hide the worry from her face. 

“Right, right. But we’ve,” she gestured to indicate herself and them, “both agreed that actually Double Trouble’s a big softie deep down,” Catra said. 

Double Trouble just sighed. 

“So, why don’t we both sit down, and we can get your interview done with,” Adora said, looking over at Double Trouble with distrust. 

Adora sat down on the couch, leaving just enough room for Catra to comfortably sit down next to her.

So Catra instead lay down on the couch, half-draped in her girlfriend’s lap, and smirked up at Double Trouble.

Glimmer had told her something about the best revenge being to live well, and that really did make sense. It was probably true, cheesy as it was. 

As she lay there purring, listening to Adora question Double Trouble, she realized another truth. Petty comeuppance was the second best form of revenge, and why not have both?

**Author's Note:**

> Please do inform me of typos, especially if I misgender Double Trouble. I went through the work several times to make sure to always use 'they' when referring to Double Trouble, but if I missed something I want to know, because I *will* change it. 
> 
> Otherwise, the usual: Kudos, comment, subscribe I suppose! I often post stuff on a different site nowadays, but who knows, I certainly didn't expect this story to come out.


End file.
